Youth Unemployment

Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts

Wednesday 9th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Byrne]

This is the Minister whom the chairman of the UK Statistics Authority once wrote to about his casual use of statistics, so I shall take no lessons from him about statistics traded across the Dispatch Box.

[Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman advise me on the future jobs fund, which he heralds as a great creator of opportunities? Owing to EU rules on wage subsidy claims, posts offered had to be newly created; they could not be normal vacancies. How many young people got real, permanent jobs out of the future jobs fund?

[Mr Byrne]

The hon. Lady need only look at the statistics, including those for her area. This year, long-term youth unemployment has risen by one third in Solihull. The future jobs fund was helping to bring youth unemployment down. To return to the point made by the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart), we have to help young people stay close to the labour market because if we let them drift into long-term unemployment, they have a bigger chance of being unemployed in the future, of being low paid and of drifting into ill health. That is why the right decision for her constituents, as well as mine, is not to do nothing, but to act.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)]

I shall be very brief. There is not enough time to cover everything mentioned in the motion, so I will avoid the usual political knockabout in the first part of the motion, which is the Labour narrative about how we got into this economic situation. Those arguments are well rehearsed. What matters is not how we got here, but how we get out. I agree with some of the suggestions the Opposition have made. I have long campaigned for a 5% VAT rate on home renovation materials and have asked the industry to analyse the cost-effectiveness of that proposal.

[Mark Lazarowicz]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Lorely Burt]

I will not, if the hon. Gentleman will forgive me.

I agree that we could work up a programme to give national insurance relief to small companies taking on new workers, maybe even in the form of a rebate after the first complete year of employment. I have got lots of other ideas, which I hope colleagues in the Treasury will consider. Again, I agree with the Opposition: we need more incentives to stimulate private business to rev up the engine of growth.

It all boils down to growth, but it must be growth in the private sector, not growth led by creating jobs that do not exist, which is what one could argue the future jobs fund did. The Minister has outlined all the steps we are taking to create jobs and prosperity. The motion says only two things about youth unemployment: that long-term youth unemployment is up, and that we should not have scrapped the future jobs fund. Well, youth unemployment is up, but it grew under Labour by 40%—going from 664,000 unemployed 16 to 24-year-olds in May 1997 to 924,000 in May 2010. According to the latest statistics, that figure is 991,000. I hope that a Labour Member will intervene to explain to me how that equates to a 68% increase because, according to my mathematics, that seems more like 7%.

[Meg Hillier]

I thank the hon. Lady for giving way, especially given that time is short. Does she not agree that, out in the real world, people do not want the bickering. What they are concerned about, as we should be, is that an entire cohort—for example, graduates—is experiencing a higher rate of unemployment. We should be addressing the whole cohort issue, because we are condemning an entire group of young people to lower incomes and worse life chances as a result of Government policies.

[Lorely Burt]

I am sure we agree on the seriousness of the situation and all the different groups of young people who are affected. Unfortunately, the hon. Lady did not answer my question, but never mind.

[Rachel Reeves (Leeds West) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lorely Burt]

I am sorry, but I will not give way.

Dealing with youth unemployment is incredibly hard, but the Opposition should not make political capital out of a relatively small increase in existing figures that are a legacy of their own figures.

[Rachel Reeves]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Lorely Burt]

I have only two minutes. I am very sorry.

The future jobs fund was well intentioned, but ineffective and expensive. It created new positions that were not, by definition, real jobs. It was so ineffective, in fact, that young people who were not on the programme fared better in getting real employment than those who were. It cost more than it saved, and failed to accomplish its targets. Now the Opposition are also calling for a bank levy to raise funds for a youth jobs fund. However, we have already introduced a bank levy, and it raises more each year than they managed to raise with their bankers’ bonus tax.

So what have we done for young unemployed people? We have concentrated on apprenticeships and getting people into real jobs. We have exceeded the targets in our apprenticeship scheme, with the provisional figures showing that the number of apprenticeships has grown by 58% across the UK and some areas showing growth of 198%. Perhaps the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne) would like to welcome the 82% rise in apprenticeships in his constituency. The Work programme is designed to ensure that people can get out of a cycle of benefits and get back into work that pays. The jury is still out on the Work programme, but I am really hopeful that the work of specialist agencies, using their skills to find jobs for long-term unemployed individuals, will bear fruit.

I welcome the fact that Labour Members are bringing ideas to the table. As I said, I agree with some of them, but not all. We will listen and we will work with all colleagues in this House for a more prosperous future for all our constituents.